Simon Crean (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Trade and Regional Development) Share this | Hansard source

He is still carrying on in a stupid way now. I acknowledge that the horses involved were show horses, not racehorses, and that Reins of Fire is the name of a troupe of horses and not the name of an individual horse. But these minor details do not answer the central facts of the case. Those issues, which I have talked of before, go to the core of what we are asking the minister about, and we want a full explanation. He still has not answered the central issues in this case. He still owes a response to the parliament and, in fact, Labor have been made aware of a number of other concerns about this particular importation and we will be vigorously pursing these issues.

The new charge that I make today goes to the risk in relation to equine influenza from horses from different places that are co-mingled. Between 17 and 20 August this year, two horses from Ireland and one from the US were stabled close to a horse imported from Japan in breach of procedures actively developed by the Commonwealth and state quarantine experts. I ask the minister: can he confirm that these three horses subsequently presented with equine influenza symptoms? When did the minister first become aware of this high-risk practice and what actions did he take? This is a minister who has a lot of questions to answer. Instead of chortling from the sidelines, let him give a full explanation in this place, and let him be prepared to adopt the amendments that we are proposing that will strengthen the guidelines to get to the bottom of their—(Time expired)

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